CLOSED -- Flying Duna AGAIN (Thanks for Participating)

[Sirine]

You REALLY might want to check the rules. I'm quite sure:

It's great if the plane can glide for a really long time due to high lift- but exploiting the way control surfaces work to generate infinite flying (that's what an infiniglider is- and that also appears to be the reason your plane can fly forever) is quite explicitly *banned*...

Sorry to rain on your parade

And, uhhh, how are those ion engines going to work during Dunar night, by the way?

Below "are" infinite flying...

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/57283-Game-Bugs-Just-for-fun-Infiniglide

Mine craft...does not classified as infiniteglide...it glide and it can land.... and it thrust by ion engines, and it can't fly without one...

So, I believe I still stick to the rule...

And, uhhh, how are those ion engines going to work during Dunar night, by the way?

Those ion engines are Not going to flyable at Dunar night. However, it can enter Eternal flying mode...gliding, and altitude going down, slowly.

[Northstar1989]

Be that as it may, the rules is the rules. No cfg editing to make new parts or tweak the stats of existing parts, so no turning a 1.25m tank into a 2.5m tank. Otherwise, folks could just as easily tweak other parts to have no weight, more lift, more horsepower, etc. Sorry.

I made this rule because

1. a requirement for posting a challenge is doing it yourself, and I'd done this
   
2. it's more challenging than landing on low ground, and this IS a challenge, and
   
3. it's more useful for exploring Duna, the vast bulk of the surface being at least 2000m high. If you can't land there, you're stuck in the canyons, which is what most folks do.
   

But I fail to see why you're concerned about doing the 1st landing at 2500m. You still have to land at 2500m anyway. Remember, the purpose of the plane is to fly back and forth indefinitely between scattered bases. One of these is assumed to be at 2500m or above, which is why you have to land there to start with. So even if you do the initial landing lower down, you still have to land at 2500m eventually. Might as well do it the 1st time.

Isn't welding parts technically creating new parts? I fail to see how creating a long 2.5 meter fuel tank by welding short 2.5 meter fuel tanks already in the mod is any different from creating a long 2.5 meter fuel tank by upsizing a long 1.25 meter fuel tank already in the mod. Not everyone has that mod installed anyways- so not everyone has those parts- and as I said, no changes were made aside from upsizing the thing and changing mass and resource capacity directly to scale, and the joint strength to the same as the 2.5 meter fuel tank already in the mod.

Regardless, my main focus at the moment has become my launch of the Eagle. The Advanced Spaceplane might be a good design- but it's too laggy on my weak computer without a part weld or two, and it's really not all that many parts (at 60-68 parts for the Mk3, depending on the fuel tanks allowed, it has less than the D'OH did, for instance- and it's really not fair I can't launch a design as complex as yours was just because my computer is a lot slower)- I just have a terrible computer. So, that design has gone on the backburner for the moment.

Anyways, an update on the Eagle:

First of all, I've got coverage on this going on my Mission Reports thread too- so forgive me if I miss a detail or two.

Anyways, I started off my trip to Duna on a bad foot. After getting to orbit, my lag was absolutely crippling- even though after dumping the damaged Eagle the remaining copy and transfer stage altogether only had 70 parts. So I decided to trust MechJeb to make my rendezvous with my fuel depot- which turned out be a huge mistake. When I got to orbit, the transfer stage had an amazing 5000+ Delta-V left (I'm really not sure why I wanted to top it off at all). After quite a while of MechJeb putzing around with seemingly random burns for my transfer stage until I finally got angry, turned it off, and brought it into the depot myself- I only had about 2000 left... But, at least I did make it to the LFO depot (and drained the thing dry) to make up 800-1000 of that Delta-V or so... Here's a nice picture of the Eagle transfer stage approaching the depot:

I then moved into a high parking orbit (image below), and reduced my total flights-in-progress a bit by recycling some obsolete ships (with my Scrapper Ship- see my Mission Reports thread) to reduce lag.

Finally, after much delay, I started off my Duna transfer (a bit late- you'll see I missed the ideal transfer window by a good bit) the way I always do- with a Muna gravity assist:

As you can see, the Eagle transfer stage is safely on an escape trajectory out of the Kerbin system... And I missed the ideal transfer window by a lot- which means I'm going to spend most of that extra Delta-V just getting an intercept...

Assuming my transfer stage makes it (I've never failed to make Duna on any mission yet- although I have had a few fiascoes with Eve- once even with what was supposed to be a manned permanent orbital station- as I seem to have a much harder time plotting good courses towards the center of the solar system), soon I'll be reporting on my aerocapture and landing on Duna!

By the way, there are no rules against quicksaves/loads, right? I did manage to blow up my nuclear engines once when I left them running on a long burn while I went AFK to grab a drink of water, and had to re-load a quicksave just before the burn...

Also, I know the pictures are getting a little out of hand. How do I stick them all in a single slideshow together, like I've seen other people do on the forums?

P.S. If anyone was wondering where I got that huge, 5 meter fuel tank and engine from- they're from the NovaPunch2 parts pack. I normally only use this diameter for my heavy lifter stages- but for a pair of planes with this much lift (remember, there were two of them) I made an exception... Anyways, I highly recommend NovaPunch2 to anyone who's looking to reduce their part counts and simplify their heavy lifter stages- while also making them more realistic (no REAL space program would strap four 2.5 meter rockets together- they'd just make a 5 meter rocket instead), or wants to try any of the million other great parts it offers...

Edited November 20, 2013 by Northstar1989

[Northstar1989]

Below "are" infinite flying...

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/57283-Game-Bugs-Just-for-fun-Infiniglide

Mine craft...does not classified as infiniteglide...it glide and it can land.... and it thrust by ion engines, and it can't fly without one...

So, I believe I still stick to the rule...

Those ion engines are Not going to flyable at Dunar night. However, it can enter Eternal flying mode...gliding, and altitude going down, slowly.

That's ONE version of an infniglider I've never seen before.

The one I'm more familiar with relies on control surfaces snapping back and forth in a more, err, linear manner to generate mock-thrust. But, while if it uses ion engines for its thrust it's not really a truly "infinite" flyer (the only TRULY infinite flyers are craft that use no fuel, and can either fly at night, or outrun the planet's rotation- such as a high-speed electric propeller craft like the D'OH. Even my thermal turbojets don't really count, since their uranium does EVENTUALLY need reprocessing- after a couple months of continuous operation or so.), it's not an infiniglider clearly.

Anyways, in that case; nice craft. Is it all-stock too? That SHOULD totally be worth bonus points if it is... Geschosskopf, are you listening?

[Sirine]

That's ONE version of an infniglider I've never seen before.

The one I'm more familiar with relies on control surfaces snapping back and forth in a more, err, linear manner to generate mock-thrust. But, while if it uses ion engines for its thrust it's not really a truly "infinite" flyer (the only TRULY infinite flyers are craft that use no fuel, and can either fly at night, or outrun the planet's rotation- such as a high-speed electric propeller craft like the D'OH. Even my thermal turbojets don't really count, since their uranium does EVENTUALLY need reprocessing- after a couple months of continuous operation or so.), it's not an infiniglider clearly.

Anyways, in that case; nice craft. Is it all-stock too? That SHOULD totally be worth bonus points if it is... Geschosskopf, are you listening?

Yeap. 100% stock. I think it can fly at Eve too. Perhaps, Geshosskopf can hyperedit it there for a ride.

[Northstar1989]

Yeap. 100% stock. I think it can fly at Eve too. Perhaps, Geshosskopf can hyperedit it there for a ride.

Eve? Probably better than on Duna. This may sound counter-intuitive, but the really thick atmosphere and high gravity there rewards high-lift designs in terms of altitude ceiling and maneuverability a lot more than high-thrust designs: which Duna (with its low gravity and thin atmosphere) actually rewards more. This is one of the reasons I went with thermal turbojets for Duna, even though I knew propellers would be *slightly* lighter (not much after all the solar panels they need). Of course, landing is also a lot more dangerous with high-thrust, high-mass designs on Duna- and less dangerous on Eve.

In other news, here's a quick couple screenshots of my Eagle transfer stage, which just performed its intercept burn (MORE THAN TWENTY-ONE MINUTES LONG!) with Duna, and the orbit map... As you might have guessed, there's a LOT of fuel in that tank (thousands upon thousands of units), and those are nuclear engines- or I would never have been able to sustain a burn that long... (as was, I burned up more than half my remaining Oxidizer making it- though I have a lot of spare LiquidFuel to combine with Oxidizer from electrolyzing regolith on Ike for a return trip- once I get a KSP Interstellar Science Lab out there.)

Edited November 20, 2013 by Northstar1989

[Geschosskopf]

Part 2: Duna -->> Landing 2 planes.

So far so good .

Sew on your flight jacket?

Seriously.... I just want it to be display here. In this forum. I don't have a flight jacket. and I don't have flight license...And if I do....I don't want it to be sew on my jacket....

The flight jacket is imaginary. The picture is just supposed to LOOK like a jacket patch. Imagine Jeb wearing his flight jacket with this sewn on the sleeve while he's shooting pool in the astronaut building .

[Geschosskopf]

Part 3: Duna --> Flying and Landing.

Took forever to fly....current max speed 140m/s++, air ceiling 6400m....or higher...

Eternal flying mode active and able to maintain 3000m floating...(no thrust generate from any engines). With 100m/s++ speed.

I'm very impressed! An elegant design that not only works but does so without mods and performs better than mine. And you didn't even bother retracting the landing gear . I didn't believe ion engines would work so well in an atmosphere, even one as thin as Duna's. I'll have to try this myself next time.

But yeah, it takes a long time to go any distance at 100-150m/s. I feel your pain there. But OTOH, flying is still way faster than driving that same distance .

Just to be clear, when you say "Eternal Flight", you mean gliding, right? That is, if you don't restart the engines, eventually you'll come down to the ground? If so, that's perfectly legal. There's no requirement that the engine run all the time and a powered climb-glide-repeat flight profile is a logical and realistic solution to some of the problems of flying on Duna. That was the only way I could get a Kethane jet engine to work at all on Duna myself.

Please let me know if I'm still missing anything...

Well, you still have to do an airplane-style landing at 2500m or above. It looks like this flight landed at 1142m. Otherwise, I think you've got it. I believe you've got a docking port on the nose so can refuel the plane. So if your other plane is still sitting at 2500m, just take off, turn around, and land back by the flag and you'll be done.

Let me see....

+1 for all Kerbals inside

+1 for 6000m+ ceiling (and highest altitude shown in your pics is 6701m, which I think is the new record)

+1 for circumnavigating

That would put you in 1st place provided you can do the 2500m airplane-style landing. GREAT WORK!

[Geschosskopf]

Isn't welding parts technically creating new parts?

I'm through arguing this. My decision is final. I sympathize with your lag situation but it's something you got yourself into by the design choices you made. Nobody forced you to use argon-burners. And if you want to reduce your part count, you've got other options. For instance, you could use Procedural Wings instead of that swarm of individual wing parts. And maybe Stretchy Tanks, too, although I don't know if that works on argon.

The bottom line is, this is an engineering challenge. Just like in the real world, you have to produce something that meets the design specs you might not agree with, while staying within the constraints you might not like. But that's what engineering is all about.

Assuming my transfer stage makes it (I've never failed to make Duna on any mission yet- although I have had a few fiascoes with Eve- once even with what was supposed to be a manned permanent orbital station- as I seem to have a much harder time plotting good courses towards the center of the solar system), soon I'll be reporting on my aerocapture and landing on Duna!

Can't wait to see it. And I salute you for attempting to work this challenge into your ongoing "story" game save instead of creating a new game just for this project. I really pulling for you.

By the way, there are no rules against quicksaves/loads, right? I did manage to blow up my nuclear engines once when I left them running on a long burn while I went AFK to grab a drink of water, and had to re-load a quicksave just before the burn...

Absolutely use F5/F9. Especially for aerobraking, which is just a crapshoot because of the total lack of in-game instrumentation for it. Nobody should go to all this work just to have it blow up from a silly oversight or game glitch.

Also, I know the pictures are getting a little out of hand. How do I stick them all in a single slideshow together, like I've seen other people do on the forums?

If you load them all into an Imgur album, you can link the album itself directly as Sirine is doing. There's a tutorial for how to do that in the Announcements section of this forum.

[Northstar1989]

I'm through arguing this. My decision is final. I sympathize with your lag situation but it's something you got yourself into by the design choices you made. Nobody forced you to use argon-burners. And if you want to reduce your part count, you've got other options. For instance, you could use Procedural Wings instead of that swarm of individual wing parts. And maybe Stretchy Tanks, too, although I don't know if that works on argon.

Procedural Wings sounds interesting. I've never heard of it. What is it, and where could I get it? (I assume it's a mod) I've also heard of Stretchy Tanks before- thoguh I have no idea how it works or how good it is...

Do keep in mind though, my part count *IS* lower than the D'OH's was- so you really can't say I chose a high part-count solution, when you went much further in that direction (for a plane that can't reach Duna on its own power- my such models have only around 40 parts) yourself... It would be hard to design something that would work nearly as well as an SSTDABK with fewer parts...

The bottom line is, this is an engineering challenge. Just like in the real world, you have to produce something that meets the design specs you might not agree with, while staying within the constraints you might not like. But that's what engineering is all about.

Understood- but nowhere in the guidelines is there anything about part count, or the strength of your computer. If you could point me in the way of some mods/tools/utilities that might help me reduce the part-count, or a tutorial on how to weld *non-stock* parts though (the one I found only seemed to work with stock parts), that would be greatly appreciated. Didn't you say fuel tank welding wasn't allowed anyways though?

Can't wait to see it. And I salute you for attempting to work this challenge into your ongoing "story" game save instead of creating a new game just for this project. I really pulling for you.

Thanks. If you check my Mission Reports thread, I've designed a flotilla of three other major ships to begin my Duna colonization effort... Their liftoff rockets are even heavier than the Eagle's, but their payloads are much heavier too- so they have less Delta-V and will probably have to take slower intercept trajectories- meaning they will arrive some time after the Eagle has already attempted landing on its own (if it can't enter from space directly, I'll need to construct a detachable landing rocket in-orbit, and hook it up with that via its KAS connector port. The plane itself was, of course, constructed on Kerbin- as will be the colonization flotilla.)

Absolutely use F5/F9. Especially for aerobraking, which is just a crapshoot because of the total lack of in-game instrumentation for it. Nobody should go to all this work just to have it blow up from a silly oversight or game glitch.

Thanks. I was definitely thinking I'd need this for aerobraking in particular- it's annoying when your ship smashes into the surface or goes flying out of the system simply because of a couple m/s on the adjustment burn for the aerobrake...

If you load them all into an Imgur album, you can link the album itself directly as Sirine is doing. There's a tutorial for how to do that in the Announcements section of this forum.

I actually tried this before- though not with the tutorial- and it didn't work... I'll have to take a look at it, and see if it can provide me with some insight as to what I might be doing wrong...

Oh, and, because I try to make it a policy to include at least one image with every reply, and never make text-only posts- here is an image of the current incarnation of my Duna Science Module on the launchpad (one of the three main colonization ships). It's not ready for liftoff yet- as you can see it's still rather top-heavy, and will probably flip over a few thousands meters up (I aim to correct this with radial boosters on the upper stages to raise the center of thrust).

Edited November 21, 2013 by Northstar1989

[Sirine]

@NorthStar1989

@Geschosskopf

Well, I think I can go for the landing...Just give me a moment.

[Shalashalska]

Is using kerbal grease allowed?

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/58491-Catastrophe-18-Kerbals-killed-in-one-rescue-mission

[Northstar1989]

@NorthStar1989

@Geschosskopf

Well, I think I can go for the landing...Just give me a moment.

Thanks. I think I was having trouble with not deleting the #0, as I didn't know to do that...

Here's an album of images on the liftoff of my Science Module then (not really part of the challenge itself, but the Eagle is part of a larger colonization effort- and she will eventually be meeting up with crew and equipment dropped to the surface from some of these ships- and servicing the bases I will be establishing)

Javascript is disabled. View full album

As you can see from the orbital map image, after establishing a stable orbit I burned for an intercept with the Mun. The Science Module is now on a free return trajectory to the Mun (it was by accident- but hey, from a roleplaying perspective it never hurts to be safe in case something fails). My plan is to land her there and test out the regolith electrolysis capabilities of the Science Lab- which I'll be using again on Ike to produce Aluminum and Oxidizer for Aluminum-Hybrid and LFO rockets... I should also be able to pick up nearly 30 tons of fuel (if I only refill the Aluminum Hyrbid rockets- and save extracting additional Oxidizer for when the Science Module reaches Ike- to save weight) that way- which would represent a big increase in the fuel load of the craft (currently, the vessel weighs about 110-120 tons, with a significant amount of that in dry weight).

Also, I neglected to mention this before, but I like to roleplay a bit with my manned interplanetary transfer burns- i.e. I don't always take the path that requires the least Delta-V, instead often going for higher- energy, faster intercepts that minimize the time my crew spends in-transit... (I did this for the Eagle- since it doesn't have much room for radiation shielding or to store supplies.) But the Duna colonization ships are meant to be better-equipped (and radiation-shielded) long-term efforts, so I'll probably go with slower intercepts for them...

Edited November 21, 2013 by Northstar1989

[Sirine]

Is using kerbal grease allowed?

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/58491-Catastrophe-18-Kerbals-killed-in-one-rescue-mission

Wonder why the above post is here....

Nvm. Here is my update...

1) I try to land back to that flag area..but it just too steep...and I'm not gaining enough high.

2) So, I decided to land on the other side of the hill...

3) And in the mid flight, I remember that 'persistence trails' plugin... activate it, and show the landing trails...

4) Look good. I'm happy.

Javascript is disabled. View full album

Edited November 21, 2013 by Sirine
typo+Spelling.

[Geschosskopf]

Procedural Wings sounds interesting. I've never heard of it. What is it, and where could I get it? (I assume it's a mod) I've also heard of Stretchy Tanks before- thoguh I have no idea how it works or how good it is...

Both are mods you can find at Spaceport. Both work somewhat the same way. With Pwings, you put a wing part on the ship, then stretch it in various directions to make 1 wing of the desired size and shape. The left and weight values get calculated as you do this to be in line with game norms. So, 1 wing per side instead of however many separate parts you have. Stanks works very much the same. Start with a tank of a given size and diameter and stretch it longitudinally until it has the exact amount of fuel you want. The diameter doesn't change, but the fuel and weight do. But I don't know if this works for argon--you'll have to check that.

Thanks. I was definitely thinking I'd need this for aerobraking in particular- it's annoying when your ship smashes into the surface or goes flying out of the system simply because of a couple m/s on the adjustment burn for the aerobrake...

Aerobraking depends on 2 things: the speed you have when you begin the run and the orbit altitude you want to end up with. The faster you come in and the lower orbit you want at the end, the lower you have to go in the atmosphere, or the more passes you need to make at higher altitudes. Because your Eagle carrier only has a plane on 1 side now, you'll probably want to be gentle with it and make several passes with relatively high Pes. That's to avoid the thing flipping out from imbalanced lift and weight. You want to be low enough to get some braking but too high for the lift and off-center drag to be a serious problem.

[Geschosskopf]

Is using kerbal grease allowed?

Hehehe, I really like that thread .

Anyway, I put my own Kerbals in lawn chairs to save the weight of a capsule. But you do get bonus points if they're all inside.

[Geschosskopf]

Nvm. Here is my update...

1) I try to land back to that flag area..but it just too steep...and I'm not gaining enough high.

2) So, I decided to land on the other side of the hill...

3) And in the mid flight, I remember that 'persistence trails' plugin... activate it, and show the landing trails...

4) Look good. I'm happy.

I'm happy, too. Congratulations and thanks for playing. Add the patch to your sig and know that you are at present in 1st place. Bravo!

EDIT: Leader list in 1st post updated with Sirine in 1st place.

Edited November 21, 2013 by Geschosskopf

[Sirine]

I'm happy, too. Congratulations and thanks for playing. Add the patch to your sig and know that you are at present in 1st place. Bravo!

EDIT: Leader list in 1st post updated with Sirine in 1st place.

Thanks for the great challenge. Hope you sometimes will try my posted challenge as well.

1) Master of EVA. (Gilly version).

2) Master of EVA. (Minmus version).

3) Master of EVA. (Mun edition).

4) Master of Pinpoint Lander. (Kerbin Edition)

5) Master of Pinpoint Lander. (Mun Edition)

6) 33.1km Emergency Rescue on Jeb's Burger!

7) Christmas-is-near-Jeb-decided-to-practice-his-dancing-skill

---

[Northstar1989]

Both are mods you can find at Spaceport. Both work somewhat the same way. With Pwings, you put a wing part on the ship, then stretch it in various directions to make 1 wing of the desired size and shape. The left and weight values get calculated as you do this to be in line with game norms. So, 1 wing per side instead of however many separate parts you have. Stanks works very much the same. Start with a tank of a given size and diameter and stretch it longitudinally until it has the exact amount of fuel you want. The diameter doesn't change, but the fuel and weight do. But I don't know if this works for argon--you'll have to check that.

Aerobraking depends on 2 things: the speed you have when you begin the run and the orbit altitude you want to end up with. The faster you come in and the lower orbit you want at the end, the lower you have to go in the atmosphere, or the more passes you need to make at higher altitudes. Because your Eagle carrier only has a plane on 1 side now, you'll probably want to be gentle with it and make several passes with relatively high Pes. That's to avoid the thing flipping out from imbalanced lift and weight. You want to be low enough to get some braking but too high for the lift and off-center drag to be a serious problem.

I'll DEFINITELY have to try those mods. I just added Kethane Pack to my Career mode game anyways (they just added Career Mode compatibility in 0.81), and updated Near future to 0.24 (comes with a 2.5 meter VASIMR engine- might be useful for my Advanced Spaceplane. Maybe they even added longer 2.5 meter argon tanks to match...), so now is a great time for me to add more mods without another long game-restart waiting time... (it takes a LONG time for KSP to load on my computer, especially with all the mods I have installed...)

EDIT: Procedural Wings does NOT come up on any searches on Spaceport. Are you sure that's where I can find it???

EDIT #2: Found it! Except it wasn't called "Procedural Wings". The mod is called "Procedural Dynamics...

These mods should MASSIVELY reduce my lag- and make possible the spaceplane and rocket designs (until now) I've only dreamed of!

Edited November 21, 2013 by Northstar1989

[Sirine]

@Northstar1989

More mod. more lag...perhaps you PC can't handle too much...why don't try out the vanilla?

[Northstar1989]

@Northstar1989

More mod. more lag...perhaps you PC can't handle too much...why don't try out the vanilla?

Not necessarily. Many of the mods I install in some way REDUCE my lag- such as Novapunch2- which allows me to use much wider-diameter fuel tanks and engines instead of a bunch of smaller ones, for the same payload. Or B9 Aerospace- which provides much bigger wings than the stock ones.

Besides, most mods add some significant enhancement to gameplay. And I haven't noticed any significant increase in lag whatsoever once the game gets running as I've added mods- only a tripling or quadrupling of game-loading-time at the start. I think it depends on where a weak computer is falling short- mine has decent RAM (4GB), good hardisk space, and a good dual-core CPU- but has an inefficient OS that uses up a lot of memory (darn Windows!), a memory leak, and a terrible graphics card...

[Northstar1989]

Both are mods you can find at Spaceport. Both work somewhat the same way. With Pwings, you put a wing part on the ship, then stretch it in various directions to make 1 wing of the desired size and shape. The left and weight values get calculated as you do this to be in line with game norms. So, 1 wing per side instead of however many separate parts you have. Stanks works very much the same. Start with a tank of a given size and diameter and stretch it longitudinally until it has the exact amount of fuel you want. The diameter doesn't change, but the fuel and weight do. But I don't know if this works for argon--you'll have to check that.

Aerobraking depends on 2 things: the speed you have when you begin the run and the orbit altitude you want to end up with. The faster you come in and the lower orbit you want at the end, the lower you have to go in the atmosphere, or the more passes you need to make at higher altitudes. Because your Eagle carrier only has a plane on 1 side now, you'll probably want to be gentle with it and make several passes with relatively high Pes. That's to avoid the thing flipping out from imbalanced lift and weight. You want to be low enough to get some braking but too high for the lift and off-center drag to be a serious problem.

Downloaded and installed both Procedural Dynamics (aka "Procedural Wings") and Stretchy Tanks.

You'll have to allow me one type of *VERY MINOR* config edit though. Since neither of these mods yet has Career Mode compatibility, they have no "TechRequired" entries in their configs yet, which allow them to be used in Career Mode. So, I added techs to all their parts (for simplicity, I added all Stretch Tanks parts to VeryHeavy Rocketry, and all Procedural Dynamics parts to Heavy Aerodynamics- both are very advanced tech nodes I discovered only recently). Other than that, NO OTHER PARAMETERS HAVE BEEN CHANGED.

So, you're cool with that at least, right? Forcing me to build the same craft in a new Sandbox game (as well as any necessary refueling stations, the bases I want to land near, etc.) would simply be pointless and *very* annoying...

[Geschosskopf]

Thanks for the great challenge. Hope you sometimes will try my posted challenge as well.

I'll probably do some of those at some point. I could always do with some honing of my flying skills .

So, you're cool with that at least, right? Forcing me to build the same craft in a new Sandbox game (as well as any necessary refueling stations, the bases I want to land near, etc.) would simply be pointless and *very* annoying...

Sure, add them to Career Mode. That doesn't affect their stats and performance and you need them.

updated Near future to 0.24 (comes with a 2.5 meter VASIMR engine- might be useful for my Advanced Spaceplane. Maybe they even added longer 2.5 meter argon tanks to match...)

The 2.5m VASIMR is listed as requiring 10,000 EC/sec, but in actual practice it needs about 10,400. This puts a real damper on its usefulness because of the weight of the powerplant this requires. And sadly, no long argon tanks. Check out Flight of the Argonian for a report on my experiments with this engine.

[Northstar1989]

I'll probably do some of those at some point. I could always do with some honing of my flying skills .

Sure, add them to Career Mode. That doesn't affect their stats and performance and you need them.

The 2.5m VASIMR is listed as requiring 10,000 EC/sec, but in actual practice it needs about 10,400. This puts a real damper on its usefulness because of the weight of the powerplant this requires. And sadly, no long argon tanks. Check out Flight of the Argonian for a report on my experiments with this engine.

Do you have KSP Interstellar installed? You know that when you get to these kinds of power requirements, reactor/generator pairs using it are BY FAR the most mass-efficient to generate such massive amounts of power (assuming you're not beaming power to it by Microwave Array, like I tried to do with my Advanced Spaceplane). They also generate more energy per-ton the larger they get (the 3.75 meter reactor/generator pair is the most efficient.)

What's more, the KSP Interstellar generators can store a MASSIVE amount of energy, in mechanical form (the speed the generator is spinning), as "Megajoules". What this means in practice is that you don't need nearly enough generation capacity to run the engines constantly- you can easily store enough energy for a 28-minute burn if your generators can produce, say, half that each second... You can also attach two generators to each reactor (one on each end) for even more energy storage per ton- if you're not using the reactors for thermal rocket engines or turbojets... Combine this with a few capacitors if you need a tiny bit more juice (but it doesn't justify an entire additional reactor), and you've got a vessel with MUCH less mass than what you've got there- which means better TWR and more total Delta-V per fuel tank (which means you don't need as many of them).

In the meantime, my Duna colonization effort is progressing.

I've just finished launching the Crew Module (above), and now all I need to do is launch a second Science Module (the first one ran into a collision box error landing on the Mun, and lost both its radiators) and I'll be ready to send the whole flotilla to Duna... I've got an estimated 21,000 Delta-V between the three vessels (some have more than others), all in their final stage- so I should have more than enough Delta-V to get to Duna *quickly* if I want, and have plenty left over for powered landers (though I might rely heavily on parachutes to save fuel) and return rockets... The Eagle will have colonists to shuttle around not long after she gets to Duna!

Regards,

Northstar

Edited November 23, 2013 by Northstar1989

[Northstar1989]

Alright, SO, I've got the Duna Science Module to a parking orbit around Kerbin as well. Soon, my Duna colonization flotilla will be following in the wake of the Eagle...

IN the meantime, I just wanted to thank you for pointing me to the StretchyTanks and Procedural Dynamics (aka. "Procedural Wings") mods Geschosskopf. Already, I've put StretchyTanks to great use in launching my Duna Crew Module (as you can see in the above post) and pushed it to its very limits with my Duna Science Module Mk2 (images below).

Regards,

Northstar

Edited November 22, 2013 by Northstar1989

[Northstar1989]

Alright, so I've become really worried about how to get my working copy of the Eagle Mk2 down to the ground as it approaches closer to Duna...

What are the rules for adding extra KAS ports for attachment of a specialized skycrane descent craft from orbit? The ports would be coming off again before any actual flying around would occur if I did this- so I wouldn't be "adding to or subtracting from what will actually fly around on Duna". Skycraning also clearly falls under what is explicitly allowed under the rule after that- though it doesn't mention adding or removing temporary connector ports for skycraning.

Currently, the craft only has one radial KAS port on the underside (for UF6 reprocessing and adding/removing LFO and Argon as cargo.) At least two widely spaced radial connector ports on the topside (one on the nose and one on the tail) would be needed to allow for a stable skycrane attachment that wouldn't wobble around during descent through the atmosphere... I can add these via EVA activity very easily- and once again, they would be coming back off before the craft does any flying around.

Think of it as tying a harness around the plane using cables- like they do when loading an Apache for skycraning in real life. I'd do this if there were a way- but I have to add actual connector ports instead since there isn't a cable-tying mechanism. And, as said, I'd remove them again on the ground before flying...

Edited November 23, 2013 by Northstar1989